K’jipuktuk/Halifax – Extinction Rebellion Nova Scotia is shocked to learn that just weeks after local students organized a march of 10,000 to call for an end to the destruction of our planet, the Halifax Chamber of Commerce and the Halifax Convention Centre are arranging a speech by the President of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP), a climate denialist group that opposes climate action and pushes for the continued growth and expansion of fossil fuel mega-corporations.
CAPP famously issued a list of demands to Canada that would cause a 60 per cent rise in carbon emissions from the energy sector, according to a recent study by Environment Defence. CAPP has called Canada “disrespectful” towards oil lobbyists, and rails at scientists and the public with statements like ‘Anybody that doesn’t see [fossil fuels] as clean-tech is sadly mistaken.’ CAPP’s president also complains that oil lobbyists are ‘victims of foreign activists working very hard to limit our market access’. This is a classic denialist trope that amounts to ‘evil foreigners are tricking you,’ echoed in Donald Trump’s claim that the climate crisis is a ‘Chinese hoax’.
These vicious forms of climate denial, backed by billions in dirty oil money, are grossly irresponsible and mortally dangerous. If the Halifax Chamber of Commerce and the Halifax Convention Centre succeed in their goal of helping CAPP spread its message of climate denial and massive growth in carbon pollution, it could spell untold heartache, hardship, disasters and deaths for millions or billions of people in the decades to come. We implore the Chamber of Commerce and the Halifax Convention Centre to get behind the students, the science, and the people of the world, and cancel this visit and all future promotion of climate denialists. Concerned citizens can do their part by contacting the Chamber of Commerce and Convention Centre and politely and respectfully urging them to do what is right and reverse this ill-informed decision.
Halifax Chamber of Commerce: Tel: (902) 468-7111, info@halifaxchamber.com
Halifax Convention Centre: (902) 421-1302, sales@halifaxconventioncentre.com ”
Nova Scotia is in Mi’kma’ki, the unceded territory of the Mi’kmaw people.
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